News for the Special Education Community
by Jim Salter – Dr. Jan Brunstrom-Hernandez gently but sternly admonishes a teenage cerebral palsy patient who clearly hasn’t been doing his exercises, stressing the importance of keeping muscles loose and limber. “We know it’s not fair, but that’s the way it is,” Brunstrom-Hernandez tells 15-year-old patient Sam Ward. “Do you hear me? I know [...]
by Denise Coffey – Huge puppets line one wall of a room at the Arc of Quinebaug Valley on Cook Hill Road, in Danielson. Eleven of the 40 “Kids on the Block” look down from their shelf. There is Mark Riley, a boy with cerebral palsy in his blue wheelchair. There is Lynne Casey, a [...]
In many ways, Desaray Carroll is a typical high school teenager. She texts nonstop, hangs out with her friends, goes to the movies and out to eat. The 19-year-old Coahulla Creek High School student is surrounded with a family and friends who love and support her, so much so they campaigned for the student body [...]
by Kelsie Smith – He climbed the stairs, walked down the diving board, and dove in. 9-year-old Kellen Apple was busy practicing Tuesday night at RIT with Upstate NewYork Diving, as he has a meet in Geneseo this weekend. “I practice a lot and I have a trampoline at home and I do flips on [...]
by Laura McMullen – Ryan McGraw is a 30-year-old yoga teacher who grew up in Detroit and now lives in Chicago. He also has cerebral palsy. While the symptoms of the group of disorders can vary significantly from one person to the next, cerebral palsy often impairs movement and coordination—two skills we often think of [...]
by Lisa Weidman – It is incredible enough that Diana Livingston is graduating from Penn State Berks at the age of 20 with a bachelor of science in childhood and early adolescent education, along with her twin sister, Krisandra, on May 4. It is astonishing that she was able to graduate two years before her [...]
Cerebral palsy refers to a group of neurological disorders that affect a person’s motor skills, or body movement, and muscle coordination, caused by an abnormality or disruption in brain development, usually before a child is born. Signs and symptoms of the disorder appear during infancy or early childhood. Its early signs usually appear before [...]
A little boy from upstate New York got to live out his dream of being a firefighter this week – even though he may never be able to walk on his own, the Utica Observer-Dispatch reported. Six-year-old Teagan O’Grady, from Westmoreland, N.Y., has spastic diplegic cerebral palsy. He was born four months early, and only [...]
by Elizabeth Plank – 0:24 Simon Cowell asks the young boy called Jack Carroll to tell him a little more about him? He answers: “I’m a professional gymnast.” 1:01 “I use my cerebral palsy in my act because in comedy a lot of times, your weaknesses are your strengths,” explains the teen. 1:19 “He wants [...]
by Mike Oliver – What’s a little gray matter between researchers? A lot, it seems, as University of Alabama at Birmingham scientists become the first to show that a certain type of rehabilitation can remodel the brains of children with Cerebral Palsy by adding gray matter. The findings are published today in the journal Pediatrics. [...]
